Terry Sarten: Brits bewildered by Brexit

Flashback to 2016 and Britain's Sun newspaper celebrates Brexit.

Taxi drivers are a major source of wisdom, and riding with one in a small town we will call Nelson, I was drawn into a deep and meaningful conversation about naps and the taking thereof.

Apparently, what is known as the Nana Nap is but one form of the short recovery orientated sleep. There are other types and styles of falling asleep for a short time.

In the office, this is often disguised as "thinking" ... the eyes glaze over, the head nods and next thing it is time for a cuppa.

When watching someone's collection of holiday snaps, you drift off as the umpteenth picture of smiling people inside/ outside/standing beside some building or landmark appears.

This nap attack can be explained as empathy with the country being displayed linked to siesta.

If the holiday slides are from somewhere like Iceland, then nodding off can be explained as being in synch with the arctic cycle of months of semi-darkness.

There is always an excuse for a nap and science tells us they are good for us.

For the citizens of the once Great Britain, Brexit as either got them dozing as the whole business drags on with no end in sight or, alternatively, awake all night worrying about what will happen.

Right now, it seems to be a no-holds-barred wrestling match between those who want to quit the European Union (EU) no matter what and those who want to get some sort of a deal that will allow Britain to have their trading cake and eat it, too.

They were the bovver boys telling everyone how EU bureaucrats in Brussels were destroying the British way of life with rules and regulations and that Britain was about to be invaded by great hordes of foreigners who would take their jobs, their houses and destroy all the things that made Britain great.

Terry Sarten

It is worth noting that the two main champions for leaving Europe, Nigel Farage and Boris Johnson, have gone quiet.

They were the bovver boys telling everyone how EU bureaucrats in Brussels were destroying the British way of life with rules and regulations and that Britain was about to be invaded by great hordes of foreigners who would take their jobs, their houses and destroy all the things that made Britain great.

Leading up to the referendum, both Johnson and Farage stoked fears of an immigration invasion and claimed how all the money saved from paying the EU would go to the National Health Service. None of which was true.

Now it seems many of those who voted to leave the EU in the referendum have realised they had been duped.

This feeling has been reinforced by a Tory government that appears to have no clue about what to do. The ineptitude is mind-boggling, but so far there has been no rioting.

When the wonderfully sophisticated French get angry, they take to the streets, build barricades and hurl things at the police. In contrast, the Brits seem to be bewildered by Brexit. Leave or Remain, have a second referendum?

Those favouring leaving the EU may be suffering nostalgia, hankering for a past when Britain was Great — an island nation that stood against the Nazi threat of World War II with fish and chips the national cuisine and few foreigners, especially people of colour with different religious beliefs.

Many Brits, in voting to leave the EU, seem to have lost sight of the enormous value there is in being part of the European community of nations.

Do they not realise or understand consequences? If Britain shuts its doors to European workers this works both ways, it also means Brits cannot go and work in a Europe.

It would be easy to assume that Brits are all a bit dim not to have worked this out and there is a fierce Remain movement.

But surveys show the Remain campaign coming up against entrenched notions that "foreigners" have somehow diminished what it is to be British and that debate and logic cannot damage a fortress mentality built on bigotry.

*Terry Sarten (aka Tel) is a writer, musician and social worker _ feedback welcome: tgs@inspire.net.nz